The Business: The Definitive Singles Collection - Madness

I bought this box-set a good long time ago now and is one of those albums I only pull out sporadically; not because it isn't any good, because it is, but more because of the sheer content and material contained on this boxset which stretches across 3 massively long CDs. Featuring exclusive interviews and chats with all the members of the band at that time, each segment of talking is sandwiched between what basically amounts to a back-catalogue of all Madness's most famous hits alongside B-sides and rarely heard remixes. This includes, amongst some of my favourites, a Ska version of Swan Lake (that has to be heard to be believed and actually DOES kind of ...  Read the complete review

I know everyone seems to love them and they are silly and wacky and such good fun, but I have always found their music bleak and depressing. Maybe this is down to me hearing it at the wrong times in my life. Who are they: UK based ska group, who fuse pop and ska to great effect. At their peak in the eighties and fronted by singer Suggs. On this album: The lively 'One Step Beyond' sounds like the sountrack to some mental school trip where everything has gone wrong and the teachers have run away and riot is amok. Minimal vocals, a zany ska beat and the kind of song which would encourage grown men to dance badly. I don't like it ...  Read the complete review

This 67 Track complination should appeal to most people. It's partly a greatest hits, containing, as it does, every A-side released by the group. But its biggest market will surely be amongst completists, because it also includes every B-side, along with 11 12-inch mixes and numerous never before heard novelties, such as an exhilarating live Swan Lake (speeded up, about 4x faster than the original was!), the national anthem played on kazoo, and a destruction of Release Me that was first released by 'Engelbert Humperdink', which can surely be put down to lager. Interwoven throughout are conversations between the band, friends, and family, as well as their ...  Read the complete review

Sixty-nine songs spread over three CDs along with interviews and a booklet. What more could a person possibly ask from a band? As far as I know, this collection every single released by Madness between 1979 and 1986 - which would have to consist of every single they'd released before the band's comeback in 1999. I believe this collection costs around £20, which I my mind is a great deal seeing as alot of today's albums cost almost as much with barely a fifth the amount of songs. Following each song on the CDs are interviews with members of the band and a few other people describing interesting events in during their original run. This ...  Read the complete review

If you are a fan of Madness, then this is something you must own!! It has every single every released which means you keep coming to songs that you didn't know and start loving them as much as the other hits you know! There are a few dodgy ones, and being definitive it does have strange things on it, like the Italian version of One Step Beyond!!! it is presented well, with a very nice booklet outlining everything they had released unto 1993 and the dates etc of those releases. ...  Read the complete review